A Veterans Day art show, by real veterans

"Armistice Day, 1918" is an art exhibit about the end of World War I, and a warning about wars to come. Many of the artists are veterans,
Jim Beckerman, Staff Writer, @jimbeckerman1

"Fathers and Sons" by Walt Nygard , shown here, is one of the works on display at the Armistice Day 2018 art Exhibit on November 10, 2018 at the The Puffiin Foundation in Teaneck, NJ.(Photo: Jim Anness/Special to NorthJersey.com)

Artists paint what they see. And if the artists happen to be veterans, you can bet they've seen a lot.

"We feel the urgency of this," said Walt Nygard, artist, Vietnam veteran (Marine Corps, 1969 to 1970), Teaneck resident since 1980, and one of three curators of "Armistice Day, 2018," an art exhibit that opened Saturday at Teaneck's Puffin Cultural Forum.

"Fathers and Sons," his stark black and white linoleum block print of a soldier embracing a grieving boy in a cemetery, is one of 90 pieces by 37 artists — a third of them veterans — that will be on display through Jan. 19 in honor of the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I.

An estimated 40 million people died in World War I, in the name of nationalism. Now, a century after the world laid down its arms, on Nov. 11, 1918 — 100 years ago, Sunday — a number of world leaders, including the U.S. president, are describing themselves as "nationalists."

Artist Ron Erikson with two of his pieces on display At the "Armistice Day 2018" Art Exhibit on November 10, 2018 at the The Puffiin Foundation in Teaneck, NJ.(Photo: Jim Anness/Special to NorthJersey.com)

"The most important thing is to raise people's awareness of the history of war," said artist and co-curator Ron Erickson, a Bogota resident, who served in the Marine Corps from 1982 to 1985.

One of his pieces, "America," is a stylized image, painted in oil, of houses and trees going up in lurid red and yellow flame.

"Ivan's Childhood," a piece on display at the Armistice Day 2018 art Exhibit on November 10, 2018 at the The Puffiin Foundation in Teaneck, NJ.(Photo: Copy Photo/ Jim Anness/Special to NorthJersey.com)

"We need to get it into people's heads that war is a completely fruitless endeavor," Erickson said.

Much of the art in the exhibit is in this vein: death's heads, gas masks, refugees and barbed wire. But there are also a few peaceful images. "After the Armistice," acrylic on canvas, shows poppies — traditional symbol of the World War I dead — on a grave. Though even here, war's storm clouds are on the horizon.

Jan Barry, former reporter/columinist at The Record and Ramapo College professor, in front of one of his pieces at the Armistice Day 2018 art Exhibit on November 10, 2018 at the The Puffiin Foundation in Teaneck, NJ.(Photo: Jim Anness/Special to NorthJersey.com)

"We're addressing American culture, which is saturated with advertising propaganda, that everything the military does is wonderful," said artist and co-curator Jan Barry of Teaneck, a former columnist at The Record who served in Vietnam in 1962 and 1963 in an army aviation unit.

"The military is going to train you for jobs, train you for character, and citizenship," Barry said. "We know from experience that not that many people navigated that, and ended up there."

The "Armistice Day, 2018" exhibit is of a piece with other shows, films, lectures and events held at The Puffin Cultural Forum, founded in 1983 by Teaneck philanthropists Gladys and Perry Rosenstein to advance progressive thought.

All three of these guys are thinking very progressively.

"We have to find a way to end war," said Nygard, whose father and son also served in the military. "That may be idealistic. But in an overcrowded world, in the middle of incredible environmental degradation, with starvation, poverty and racism, we have to try to solve these problems with all the resources that go into making war."

A corner of the gallery dedicated to protest art At the Armistice Day 2018 art Exhibit on November 10, 2018 at the The Puffiin Foundation in Teaneck, NJ.(Photo: Jim Anness/Special to NorthJersey.com)

Some of the pieces in the exhibit, including Nygard's, are on so-called "front-line paper," recycled from old military uniforms. The idea here is to "reclaim" the old material. But more important, to these vets, is reclaiming Armistice Day itself.

It became "Veterans Day" in 1954, when its scope was widened to include World War II veterans. But it also, in the process, insidiously changed meanings, Barry believes. Armistice Day was about working for peace. Veteran's Day is about celebrating war.

History Repeats Itself by artist Liz Mitchell at the "Armistice Day 2018" Art Exhibit on November 10, 2018 at the The Puffiin Foundation in Teaneck, NJ.(Photo: Jim Anness/Special to NorthJersey.com)

"One hundred years ago, this country and many countries in Europe took very seriously working for peace," Barry said. "This was a national holiday in this country. Then the name was changed to Veterans Day. It shifted the focus from working for peace to honoring warriors. And very quickly our culture turned it into just another opportunity to have car sales."